The Dastyari stuff has been covered before and there wasn't anything new in it (but important to cover in the context of the wider story). The Andrew Robb one I always thought was dodgy as and the amount he was getting paid really shocked me.

Bob Carr must be on millions.

Doesn't it make you uncomfortable how easily our political officials are being corrupted by foreign money?

Very. Political donations should be banned all together as it's too easy to corrupt people. Banning only foreign ones doesn't go far enough as there are plenty of naturalised Australians still with foreign agendas.

Completely agree.

Buying political favours is nothing short of corruption. I am entirely suspicious of any kind of political donation, more so when said donations come from businesses or entities that stand to gain something from the party they donated to ascending to power.

Very concerning.

I presume that this ban would include Union donations to the Labor Party right? 

What part of "All together" suggests it wouldn't?

OK just checking. That would make the playing field fair.

Many people when they talk about banning donations seem to think union donations are ok. Which in effect would undermine the LNP to oblivion because they would have zero donations but Labor Party will have millions worth in union donations. 

Union donations are up there with foreign corporations when it comes to corrupt.

I have no love for unions.

You are not wrong with about the corruption with union fees. 

In my opinion, union donations are the worst of all.

The Adani mine to go ahead thanks to the QLD ALP.

Can't wait for them to get slaughtered next election.

-PB

Terrible news. We don't need anymore f*cking coal mines. We especially don't need one that requires us to supply $1bn in funding.

Lets see the ALP explain where the benefits are for this one.

Side note: why even do Environmental Impact Studies when they get ignored like this one was?

But if we don't sell it, then another country will because there will still be demand for Coal in developing economies like China and India.

We might as well get the money and the jobs. 

There really isn't. India maybe but China has significantly lowered its coal demand.

The Adani mine is thermal coal not the far more valuable coking coal.

I would like to see where the money and the jobs come from.

The 'leftard' Greens have pushed for greater stringency on donations than the 2 majors

LNP have most to lose financially from the banning of donations

Oh yay you're going to be a child and throw that into everything you respond to of mine, I look forward to it.........

The greens do have some things right. However all political donations should be banned.

Such loonies, those greenies.....

I don't think so. China will be increasing its demand for coal right up to 2030. After that then who knows. China is however spending a lot on renewables - some 650 billion over the next 10 years which is significant but really barely touches the side in its energy requirements. It will be a long time before they start to reduce their demand for Coal. 

Bottom line is that the Coal industry will thrive for the next 20 odd years. 

I don't have any knowledge about what types of coal Adani will be extracting from the ground. But it makes sense to me for Australia to reap the benefits and keep people in jobs even though demand within Australia is declining. 

China has committed to energy targets and therefore are rapidly reducing coal demand. They have far more capacity to turn around major infrastructure projects because they don't have issues with unions inflating wages for labourers to do sweet FA.

Adani is extracting thermal coal used in power generation.

No it doesn't actually.

LNP donations are only a fraction of the donations to the ALP. So in effect, the LNP has the more to gain from a blanket ban which includes unions.

Plus, you can't ban those donations without a complete blanket ban which includes the trade unions. Otherwise, you effectively marginalize the LNP whilst the ALP still gets millions from the unions which in effect would subvert democracy as the playing field will be even less fair than it is today. 

No it hasn't committed to any reductions until after 2030 and even then it is reductions to 2025 levels and not 2005 levels like Australia.

And even if they do reduce their emissions below 2025 levels after 2030, there will still be huge demand for Coal within their energy sector.

I often wonder how someone can be so factually wrong about everything and genuinely believe they are right. Not even twisting the truth like pollies often do, just flat out wrong. It's quite incredible.

Self reflecting are we?

"Reality has a liberal bias".......

Niet. My opinion might seem wrong to you but I put effort in to support that with facts and will provide references willingly. Some people will post that night is day and have absolutely nothing to back that up.

I'm still waiting on what conservative views Yassmin has been pushing out there.

" In what will be another blow for Australian coal miners, China will institute a reduction in thermal coal consumption within the next five years to cut pollution levels."

Source: China to Cut Coal Consumption

A 160million tonne reduction in consumption in 5 years, that takes us to 2021.

http://climateactiontracker.org/countries/china.html

Yep even the link he provided says the same thing. Quite incredible.

In his defence consumption is still very high, higher than anyone else by a significant margin. However, we have numerous active coal mines running below capacity in Queensland alone or currently in shut down status. Why do we need a brand new mine at a cost to us (questionable benefits also) when we can meet China's demand for coal with our existing mines.

I accept that I have completely backflipped on my appraisal of the Adani Coal Mine in the last month or 2.

ellenpee thumped everyone else prior to 2013 & 2016 elections